Exposed
by jtav
Summary: Miranda has seen Kaidan exposed, raw and vulnerable. It's only fair he turns the tables.


Letters come more slowly now, when they come at all. The first thing that the Reapers did when they came through the Charon relay was destroy the comm buoys. The second thing they did was decimate the First Fleet. The third thing they did was lay waste to Earth. Millions are dead, and dozens of major cities lie in ruins. Vancouver is one. Kaidan doesn't know if his parents are alive or dead. Casualties won't be properly accounted for until they win this war, if they win this war. He's put out feelers with old friends and new contacts, but the loss of FTL communication has slowed intelligence gathering to a crawl.

Still, the orange light of his computer terminal is almost mocking._ No new messages._ Ice cuts through him like a talon. He clenches his fist, but what he really wants to do is slam it into the desk hard enough to make a dent. He doesn't because it won't do any good. Nothing will, not even being a Spectre. He's a cautious guy by nature—some people even call him timid behind his back—but it's always because he's choosing not to do something. He hasn't been helpless since the Collectors put him in stasis and he had to watch as they dragged the colonists away. The icy talon pierces his chest a little deeper. It could make his blood run cold if he let it.

"Kaidan?"

Kaidan nearly jumps out of his skin. Miranda can be damn quiet when she wants. She stands a little in front of his desk, lips pursed in a slight frown. Her hair spills around her like a dark halo, a few artful strands falling in front of her face. She's wearing a lab coat, spotless and freshly pressed, which means she's just come from the medlab. He forces himself to nod to her. She shouldn't see him like this. "Didn't see you there."

The frown deepens. "No news about your parents, I take it?"

Kaidan's mind grinds to a halt. He doesn't talk about his search for his parents with anyone on the ship, even Shepard. They have enough on their plate without him burdening them with his personal problems when they can't help him. His personal problems are, well, personal. But Miranda Lawson has figured it out just by looking at him? The ice melts the tiniest fraction, replaced by an embarrassment that sizzles like boiling water. She shouldn't be able to read him so quickly. They're not dating. He's not sure what he should call it, but his relationship with Miranda definitely isn't like anything he's had before. She shouldn't be the one to see him scraped raw and know his private terrors.

She rests her hand on his desk, a few inches from him. He could touch her if he wanted. It's another quirk of their strange relationship: Miranda never touches him without him touching her first. "I know you've been sending a lot of messages to people who are helping with the refugees from Vancouver, and that you check your messages twice as often as anyone else on this ship. I know that your parents are from Vancouver. It wasn't hard to make an educated guess, really."

Several things flash through Kaidan's mind in rapid succession. Miranda reads his mail. Of course Miranda reads his mail. Miranda's a spy. Miranda probably knows a lot about him, more than he knows about her. Her file details numerous clandestine operations, but her personal life remains a complete blank. He doesn't know her real name or whether she has a family or anything other than that she apparently enjoys being thrown to the ground and up against the wall. She saw him on Horizon. That was the first time he really lost it since Vyrnnus, and Miranda was one of people who saw him like that. And now, she's seen him worried about his parents. It doesn't seem fair that she can do that and give nothing in trade.

But it's stupid to get mad at her about that. He and rubs his temples, but the sensation doesn't feel as good as it used to. "Just... just don't tell me everything's going to be okay."

Her face changes. The harsh lines soften, and her eyes are merely blue-grey instead of hard sapphires. "I won't lie to you. I can only offer the same thing I always have: a distraction and a bit of amusement."

"'A distraction?' Is that what they're calling it now?" He laughs despite himself, and a little more of the ice thaws. Anything is better than thinking about his empty computer screen. "We have a really weird relationship. I haven't kissed you or seen you with your clothes off, and you know about my parents."

Miranda cocks her head to one side, and Kaidan feels a tingle settle over his skin. It's the same kind of tingle he usually has right before he sees the gleam of an enemy spotting laser. "I can arrange that."

His mouth goes dry. "Which one?"

"Either, if you like."

The tingling intensifies, changes. It's the beginning of the thrill that courses through him when he can crush a mech with his mind without worrying about hurting any actual humans. She talks about amusement, but what Miranda really offers is the chance to cut loose without guilt. He can force her arms above her head and grip her until his knuckles turn white without leaving bruises. And apparently he can stare guilt-free, too.

The remnants of the romantic he used to be tell him he ought to kiss her, but that isn't what he wants. He wants to see a little of that vulnerability in her that she's already seen in him. "The clothes," he growls.

"Men," she says with a sardonic edge that is beginning to become familiar to him. "Lock the door."

Kaidan presses a button on the underside of his desk, and the door console turns a brilliant red. Miranda reaches for the zipper at the top of her labcoat.

Kaidan stands and reaches for her. His legs feel rubbery and awkward, like they're someone else's and he's just borrowing them. "Let me," he says. She's broken down so many of his walls over the last ten days that he wants—needs—to control the pace. Every time he pins her to him, it's because of her teasing seduction. But this? This is for him.

Their gazes lock. Miranda's face is unreadable. Suddenly, he's the one being stripped. She's taking his measure, the same way she would take the measure of a target or an enemy. Kaidan fights the urge to gulp. _Who am I kidding?_ It's other guys who disrobe the beautiful woman. He's Mr. Blandly Inoffensive, the one who loses the girl to the beautiful asari or the rugged turian, the placeholder before the real hero shows up. Any minute now, Miranda will laugh in his face and leave him with the terror that won't quite let him start grieving.

But incredibly, incredibly, she nods. Kaidan grabs the zipper and tugs. Slowly. He's determined he won't rush this. The sound of the zipper is uncomfortably close to that of ripping fabric. The idea scrapes at Kaidan like a blunt knife, but he resists it. Miranda has already cost him more of his control then he's entirely comfortable with losing. He won't turn in to some rabid animal that rips her clothing away and tosses her down on the bed.

The skin of her throat and upper chest is as pale as her face. It creeped him out at first, her skin. It had seemed smooth and flawless as marble, too perfect to be entirely real. Up close he can see the subtle gradiations that transform her from uncanny to stunning. Every muscle in his body tenses in anticipation, and lust coils in his gut like a serpent waiting to strike. But it's more than lust that's driving him. It's power. Miranda Lawson, the woman who raised the dead and fought the Collectors, is letting him take her clothes off. It's a weird game they're playing. She makes him lose his mind, but lets him control her body. He wonders if he'll ever figure it out, or if it even matters that he does.

He pulls the lab coat apart, sliding it off her shoulders and down her arms, luxuriating in the subtle rasp of the material as it rubs her skin. But the real revelation is her bra, black and lacy and almost decadent. It's the sort of thing he should see on extranet fetish site or particularly vivid wet dreams. He bites down on his lip, and the small, sharp pain confirms that he is really here. And yet, the underwear fits in a strange way. He's seen her patch up Vega with impersonal efficiency, but she's also doing... this. It seems right that it should be reflected in her clothes. The lab coat and the underwear, the operative and the woman: two sides of the same coin.

He manages to tear himself away long enough to look her in the eyes again. The familiar smirk is back. "You like what you see?"

_Damn it._ He's wearing all his clothes, she's half-naked, and she's still the one in control. "I'm, ah, not making you uncomfortable, am I?"

She laughs at him again, rich and genuine. "I've been looked at all my life. You think you're the first man to stare slack-jawed at me? I'm just relieved I can still elicit a response."

Of course. He's being an idiot. Miranda isn't the type to be even a little sheepish about her looks. Her looks give her power. She revels in him seeing her like this. And there's a time and a place for that. But it's not what he wants from her right now. Lust isn't enough. He wants to _know_ her the way she seems to know him, make her lose a little of that control the way she can make him lose his.

She raises an eyebrow. "Seen enough?"

"Yeah," he breathes. There will be other days to see her with her clothes off, days he can actually enjoy the idea.

Until then, he has three goals: find his parents, defeat the Reapers and figure out what makes Miranda Lawson tick.

He just wonders if he'll be able to see any of them through.


End file.
